On Social Marketing and Social Change

Development of a Global Social Marketing Community

I have written and talked about the need to develop a global social marketing community and organization (The Global Marketing Challenge) that could be crafted around the following ideals:

To continually improve the knowledge base and skill level of people who use social marketing in their professional activities to improve the health and social conditions of people around the world.

With the purpose of creating a set of experiences for program managers; policy-makers; program planners, evaluators and staff; implementing agencies; and investor and donor organizations that provide them with knowledge and tools to utilize social marketing to improve the health of poor and vulnerable populations.

Since then, with initial support from USAID through PSP - One, I have been meeting with people, sketching out ideas and testing them, and establishing a working relationship with Rare and their RarePlanet network site to weave together a proposal I am putting out here for you to review and comment on. You can view the presentation for a global social marketing network that includes background and rationale, features and benefits of the site, and screen shots from the existing rareplanet site.

The question that people raise when they see all of this is 'How does the social network site fit into an overall picture of social marketing?' 

Envisioning a social marketing ecology places the network into a larger framework of how this site could both anchor and support social marketing practitioners, a social marketing organization (or organizations), donors and investors in social marketing, experts/consultants, and academic institutions. This digital community (social network) should weave together the strands of social marketing that now exist. It should be the catalyst that brings them together, the glue that holds them together and the platform for innovation, improvement and expansion of the field. In the following diagram I identify 5 core elements of a social marketing ecology; these include

1.    A Social Marketing Organization (a global one that may have regional and country specific affiliates).

2.    Donors or Investors (Large organizations - public, private and NGO – that support and/or implement social marketing programs around the world. I prefer the latter term as I believe they should reasonably expect to see an ROI for investing in social marketing approaches to their causes and issues and we need to provide some of the tools to make this possible for them).

3.    Universities (and affiliated faculty, particularly those that sponsor or conduct social marketing education and research programs).

4.    Experts (individuals identified as offering value to social marketing organizations and program managers as consultants, trainers or in other roles).

5.    Social Marketing Practitioners (the people who are in the field doing the work of designing, implementing, evaluating and seeking funding for social marketing programs aimed at environmental, health and social causes and issues). These are the people who should be the ultimate beneficiaries of our efforts to design a social marketing ecology in which to work for they are the ones who will create the social impact and achieve the promises social marketing holds out as an innovative and unique approach to social change.

The diagram includes a set of arrows indicating what I think are the most salient sets of exchanges between these actors we should focus on. I do not presume that no other relationships can exist (for example, directly between experts and donors or universities); my point is to offer some parsimony while also focusing our attention on how a digital social network can intermediate some of these relationships and thus create networks of value, not maintain the current state-of-affairs where direct connections predominate and power and influence go to the most connected.

Each set of arrows has a box connected with it in which some of the more salient benefits that can be exchanged between two actors, but certainly not all of them, are identified. For instance, while there may be many different benefits to relationships among Investors (Donors) and Universities, funding for the development of academic and research programs is certainly a primary interest of universities. In turn, many of these investors may expect to benefit from such investments by being able to take early advantage of advances in knowledge and practice these academic and research projects produce and apply them to their other programs and portfolios.

Similarly, I have located each set of actors proximate to what I see as their most important transactions – experts next to the social marketing organization and practitioners for example. Most important for this concept of the social marketing ecology is that all actors have primary roles to play within the digital community to service the ultimate (social) benefits of increasing the capacity, innovativeness, effectiveness and efficiency of network members (social marketing practitioners) to achieve social impact. My point here is not to be exhaustive of the relationships and possible benefits among the actors, but to provide some clear targets for thinking through our marketing of the entire ecology to prospective constituents. I do know we need to get these right, especially for practitioners and investors.

My next steps are to approach potential investors to support further development of this social marketing network (all leads will be appreciated!). An equally important, and ambitious, step is to attract programs and people to get involved in the community - to stake their claim to becoming part of a social marketing community. When you review the slideshow, I believe the benefits for doing so will become clear. And then, let me know what you think of these ideas and how you would like to become involved.

You can leave comments here, at the slideshow, or at the social marketing wiki.

Get Involved in Creating a Healthier World by 2020

Healthy People 2020, an initiative of the US Department of Health and Human Services, is now in the Action Phase in which objectives are being debated and developed to continue the tradition of earlier Healthy People initiatives of advocating for improvements in the health of every person in our country. If you are in the health space, your agency, organization or business has a stake in its outcome as this is a primary Federal policy-making tool. The Mission for HP 2020, as outlined in the Framework document is:

To improve health through strengthening policy and practice, Healthy People will:

    * Identify nationwide health improvement priorities;
    * Increase public awareness and understanding of the determinants of health, disease, and disability and the opportunities for progress;
    * Provide measurable objectives and goals that can be used at the national, state, and local levels;
    * Engage multiple sectors to take actions that are driven by the best available evidence and knowledge;
    * Identify critical research and data collection needs.

Several guest contributors and I have been writing about Health Communication (HC), Social Marketing and Health Information Technology (HIT) issues that HP 2020 should address on this blog. In the past week, two teleconferences have been held to open up the process of HC and HIT objective development to all interested parties. In these calls, some of the major points that were raised were:

• The adoption of a social determinants framework signals that objectives should not only address individual decisions and practices that increase or decrease the risk of disease and disability, but also the physical and social environments that contribute to, or protect against, diseases and disabilities.

• Objectives should also consider a life course approach to their development where Life Stages are used to divide the life course into discrete blocks (e.g., infancy, childhood, etc.) to facilitate monitoring and interventions and Developmental Stages are used as a way to examine the impact of early life experiences and exposures on health status later in life.

• The current Health Communication objectives need to be reviewed to see which ones are still salient and relevant as we move into the next decade. For example, is ‘at home use of the internet’ still what to focus on for the next ten years, or should we be thinking about mobile broadband internet access for all people? Is disclosure on health websites still important, and if so, how does this objective need to be adjusted to focus on the world of 2020?  Preliminary recommendations about HC/HIT objectives from the work group are due 11 March 2009 (see below for more information about how to join).

• Data sources against which to set baselines, benchmarks and outcomes are a critical need (and in short supply) for many health communication, social marketing and HIT objectives. We need to have steady and reliable sources of data to measure progress over the next decade for any objectives that are proposed.

• What new areas do we need to create objectives for – social marketing, risk communication, global health programs (health diplomacy), personal health records, security and privacy of wireless data exchange?

The conversations have begun. One of the most open and collaborative approaches to national health policy development yet devised, an online work space for the HC and HIT discussions and objective-setting, will be available by Monday, February 23.

If you would like to participate, you need to send an email by 12PM EST on Friday, February 20, 2009 to receive a user name and password [or copy and paste into your email address line [email protected]]. On Monday you will receive your user name and password so you can start making recommendations regarding the health communication and health IT objectives right away. You will also receive weekly emails to notify you of new blog posts and discussion.

Conducting an Environmental Scan of Social Marketing

Last week I was contacted by an agency that was surveying the field of social marketing on behalf of some energy and environmental client companies [the energy industry has sponsored at least one conference on social marketing I am aware of that focused on issues such as conservation behaviors and opting into energy efficient practices].

I thought that the questions posed to me might make for some interesting food for thought and discussion.

1. When is it product marketing and when is it social marketing?

2. What is the size of the social marketing market?

3. What are the 3 major issues in social marketing?

4. What are the red flags for who does, or does not, design and implement social marketing programs?

5. How many social programs (or what percentage of them) are evaluated?

6. What are some of the more sophisticated methods used in these evaluations?

7. What types of methods are used in formative research?

8. What percentage of social marketing program budgets are devoted to evaluation?

9. Who are the innovators in the field?

10. Who are the premier thought leaders?

11. What conferences and publications do you use to keep up with the field?

Interesting to hear and see the questions turned inward rather than us always asking them of others. So what are your thoughts?

Creating Change with Social Marketing in 2009

With nearly ubiquitous calls for ‘change’ and becoming part of it, the unspoken assumption is that people already know what to do – they just need ‘direction.’ Nothing could be further from the truth. Creating change requires understanding the problem you are tackling, its determinants and context; more importantly, it requires an understanding of the problem from the viewpoint of those affected by it. Then what? It requires an understanding of how to use proven principles and tools for creating large-scale change to make it happen. Otherwise, all we have are concerned people who empathize with the plight of others. Or worse, people who become frustrated and disillusioned when their efforts are blocked or fail.

Social marketing provides a strategic framework, a management process and a toolbox to more effectively address public health, environment, health care, education and other social issues faced by contemporary societies. Learning how to harness the power of marketing for good (or as Gerard Hastings puts it, Why should the devil have all the best tunes?) will equip committed individuals and organizations, regardless of their age or size, more effective and satisfied in their work.

As 2009 opens, here are three opportunities to expose yourself and your organization to what social marketing can offer you – all places I plan to be.

The 19th Annual Social Marketing in Public Health Conference in Clearwater Beach, FL, USA, 17-20 June 2009.

Social Marketing Downunder Conference in Wellington, New Zealand, 12-13 March 2009.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Third Annual National Conference on Health Communication, Marketing, and Media in Atlanta, GA, USA, August 11-13, 2009.

Finally, research demonstrates that making public commitments can be an effective personal behavior change technique. In response to my post on effectively engaging people with social marketing, I received an email about a campaign sponsored by the Case Foundation - "Change Begins With Me" – that offers a free trip for two to the Presidential Inauguration. Go to the Case Foundation’s website and make a personal pledge to “be the change” in 2009. By finishing the sentence, Change begins with me… you can share your commitment to change your neighborhood, community or the world in 2009. No idea is too big or too small! One lucky person (and guest) will be randomly selected to attend the Inauguration of President-elect Barack Obama and related Inaugural festivities in DC. And, in the spirit of giving and active civic engagement, you will also participate in the Washington, DC Martin Luther King Day of Service (January 19th).  Entries will be accepted until 3PM EST on January 12th. My submission is already done – consider making yours.

Effectively Engaging People with Social Marketing

Long before the hyperventilation over social media marketing, social marketing was being used to create change, large and small, across the globe. The first [in-person] international meeting of social marketers in Brighton last September brought together over 700 of us and included a number of the leaders in the field [for those of you who missed it, the international social marketing on-line conference in March 2008 was "the first global conference" I am aware of and had over 1,000 participants].

The organizers of the conference have just published Effectively Engaging People: Views from the World Social Marketing Conference 2008 [PD] that features brief Q&As with 21 of the keynote speakers. Among my favorite excerpts:

To Philip Kotler:
If you were trapped in a lift for ten minutes with your nation’s President, what would you say?

We are at that stage in time, Mr President, where we are beginning to have a methodology which is cost effective and could help us resolve many of the social problems that have plagued society. That tool is social marketing.

To Sameer Deshpande:
What example would you give to highlight social marketing’s potential?

Grameen Bank by Mohammed Yunus. Although Dr.Yunus does not label his work as social marketing, his work exemplifies many of the features that we social marketers use.

To Craig Lefebvre:
How can we promote social marketing to relevant practitioners and key decision-makers?

This is not so much an empirical or evidence-based question of highlighting to them what studies have shown social marketing to be effective at doing, although that is important. For practitioners and decision makers, it’s about being able to tell them stories about how social marketing was adopted in a programme in significant and very basic ways and the improvements in reach, service and benefits that resulted. It’s that kind of narrative of before and after, helping people see and understand how social marketing approaches apply to and change practice and policy development.

To Clive Blair Stevens: 
What are the key ethical issues in trying to influence behaviour?

For me, the two key ethical issues in social marketing are: How is the social good being defined?; and who is involved in the defining of it?

To Francois Lagarde:
What are the challenges faced by an organisation with limited funds to invest in a social marketing intervention?

If they see social marketing as an isolated budget item or intervention, they face a significant challenge! If they see social marketing as a framework for planned change, they will see their whole budget as a social marketing budget.

To Seynabou Mbengue:
Where will social marketing be in 20 years?

More and more, it will be known as a successful approach to resolving many problems we encounter (health coverage, accessibility of services and products, environmental issues, and so on). I feel social issues are often barriers to market development. Improvement to the quality of life in general is a universal need throughout the world.

To Tane Cassidy:
What are the key challenges we face in further developing social marketing?

1. Establishing agreed standards or benchmarks of practice for the discipline. If we have a united view of practice that moves beyond relying on the force of individual practitioners, then we are more likely to bring others, especially decision makers, along with us.
2. Determining the right mix of individual and upstream marketing (including influencing the decision- makers) for particular social issues.
3. Breaking down the ‘system’ silos we tend to get caught up in. Often we are funded to address single issues or specific disease states. This can create competition within and across health and social disciplines, and may lead to a saturation of the market with all our messages, rather than promoting more collaborative efforts.
4. Establishing good information dissemination systems for the discipline, so that we can learn from each other and avoid duplication.
5. Demonstrating good short-term success measures as proxies for long term achievement.

To Robert Marshall:
What one thing would help most to solidify the field?

I think social marketing needs to find a professional organisation base, either in its own organisation or as part of a larger existing one. Also I think it needs to be organised as a ’community of practice’ so that it focuses on inclusion rather than exclusion of partners in different fields (other than public health).

To Paul Brewer:
How can we build capacity in social marketing?

By inspiring, motivating and training the talent to do it.

To William Smith:
Social marketing increasingly encompasses people from both marketing and the social sciences. What are the challenges in integrating learning from different disciplines?

Social marketing, like commercial marketing, is an eclectic practice. It assimilates other professions. That is one of its greatest strengths. As long as the goal is voluntary behaviour change on a large scale I am very eclectic about tactics. I worry more about missed opportunities when people come to social marketing from long careers in advertising, health promotion or environmental education or even from advocacy and don’t understand what else marketing can bring to the table.

To Jeff French:
What should we be doing to develop a robust shared evidence base?

We all have a responsibility to capture and learn from what we are doing. In social marketing this is key, so that we can reflect on what has worked and what hasn’t, and so build better interventions. Everyone has a responsibility to share as widely as possible what they have learnt, especially when things do not go as planned.

There are some who wonder whether social marketing will survive the onslaught of social media marketers. After reading these interviews, you may agree with me that the world of social marketing is changing; it is coming together and confidently looking to the future. I think it will become clear to many people in 2009 that using new communication channels to promote products and services is much different from using marketing to improve health and social conditions around the world.

I hope that in this booklet you will also find ideas, inspiration and resources for your social marketing efforts next year. And I ask you to take a moment to consider what your 2009 resolution will be for being part of the change.

Image from Brent Kompelian.

The State of Social Marketing and a Call for Action: Audio and Slideshow

The summary of the state of social marketing - history, present and future - and call for the establishment of a global community of social marketers presentation I made at the Global Social Marketing Conference is now available as both a slide show and audio file. The audio runs for about 25 minutes. I have listened to it (rarely do I do that) and it is a well-produced one and seemingly coherent. I think you will find it worth the time; let me know your thoughts and reactions. I suggest you do have the slides in front of you as you listen to it, though it seems pretty straight-forward without them (no references to 'as you can see...' without an explanation of what you are looking at. This post on the social marketing model might be helpful mid-way through it if you opt out of the slides).

All of the other keynote addresses, slides and audio, from the conference are available as well. There are too many to list and link to here - this page has them all. Links to slides from all of the breakout sessions at the conference are available on the same page as well.

The organizers of the conference have produced a wealth of information for new and more experienced social marketers that represents many different aspects of our work. Hopefully it will be a resource that agencies that do social marketing, and institutions that teach it and offer trainings in it, will incorporate into their best practices.

[backstory: The beginning of the talk features the intro to a song. You can see and watch it in its entirety here. I was inspired by Nancy Lee who that morning had used some music to end her presentation. Since I was third on a panel that convened immediately after lunch, thought that people could use a bit of wake-up call before I started talking. Fortunately I had my iPod and some helpful sound technicians who made it happen. Thanx again to them for the assist!]

Picture from the World Social Marketing Conference Gallery.

3 Calls for Social Marketing Contributions

Three opportunities for social marketers to become involved with the field's development have appeared in the last week. They include a call of participants in a survey of how social marketing is viewed by our peers, a call for conference papers and one for publication submissions from student authors.

From Susan Kirby - You are invited to participate in the first survey to identify benefits of, barriers to, and potential methods for increasing the value of social and health marketing inside organizations. This survey will be important to continuing to build on information needed to build support for a national strategy for social marketing. It is aimed at understanding how external audiences see social marketing today. Thank you for taking time to provide your anonymous insights on this important topic. No cookies will be loaded to your computer, unless you leave the survey and choose to return later. This survey will remain open until 1 November 2008 at 5pm EDT. Here is the link. Please only take the survey one time. You can contact Susan with any questions.

From Walter Wymer - 2009 International Nonprofit and Social Marketing (INSM) Conference July 14-15 in Melbourne, Victoria Australia. Co-hosted by Victoria University and Swinburne University of Technology. The theme of this year’s conference is ‘Sustainable Social Enterprise’. The Conference Committee invites submission of competitive papers, work-in-progress papers and proposals for Special Interest Sessions. An invitation is also extended for submissions in a practitioner stream. Highest quality conference papers will be published in a special edition of Social Marketing Quarterly. The Call for papers and further details about the conference.

From Lorien Abroms - Cases in Public Health Communication & Marketing is a student-edited, peer-reviewed journal of The George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. We are currently seeking submissions for Volume 3. To be considered for Volume 3, student authors must submit a brief letter of intent by Friday, November 14, 2008 to the journal editors at [email protected]. The deadline for submission is Friday, December 19, 2008. The journal is scheduled for publication in June 2009. For further details and to check out past volumes.

 

The Global Social Marketing Challenge

It is time for a global social marketing organization. At the World Social Marketing Conference in Brighton yesterday, I spoke about the often separate realities of domestic and international social marketing programs. Despite their often divergent paths and areas of focus over the past 40 years or so (depending on when you date the beginning of social marketing – domestic or international), the past few years have seen a convergence of viewpoints, especially around the centrality of population-based behavior change as the core objective for social marketing programs regardless of whether they use products, services, or communications  (or preferably all three) to achieve them. The social marketing model I presented here served as my template for where the field seems to be settling.  I also noted a set of challenges that are now common to both world views and where mutual interests may be a common ground for aligning them more completely:

• Working towards equity and reducing health disparities

• Shifting from individuals to networks and communities

• Creating comprehensive approaches focused on the 4Ps and multi-sectoral collaborations or the total market approach

• Developing scalable solutions

• Achieving sustainability

But I also noted that many other problems faced by social marketers around the world stem from the lack of systematic engagement by social marketers with the outside world – diffusion has been nobody’s job. In particular, I believe that the lack of a well-developed or documented research base, and not working with the research community to make that happen, has thwarted many efforts to become active players at the policy table where decision-makers ask for evidence-based solutions and not rhetoric. Policy-makers as an audience for understanding and applying social marketing ideas is also a neglected and of concern for me. They are not simply ‘channels’ to work upstream for policy change, they are, in the ultimate sense, the co-creators of these interventions. Economists and social scientists are two of the disciplines we need to become more engaged with: economists on many different types of pricing issues and for the insights of behavioral economists, and social scientists for both their research approaches and the need to think about social networks and communities in new ways to meet the challenges of concurrent sexual partnerships for HIV prevention as well as obesity and tobacco use prevention. Finally, we need to get involved with business thought leaders by not just inviting one to deliver a speech at out conferences, but going and presenting at theirs. In this category I particularly reference social innovators and social entrepreneurs, those looking at business approaches to the base of the pyramid or the next 4 billion marketplace and social capitalists.

The next point I made had to do with our lack of appreciation for social markets rather than just focusing on audiences. In this section, I pulled from the work of Mechai Verivadya who has framed poverty alleviation for social marketers as one of working with producers, not consumers, as our partners.

A solution to may of these issues, and I did not touch on the need for workforce development for practitioners in this area as others had been talking about this at the conference already, is to stop talking about the differences and working in isolation from each other and come together as a community.

Moving forward we need to focus on:

• Earning respectability from our outside world  - the research community, policy-makers and others important for our success.

• Market creation (aka demand generation, finding consumers, developing producers)

• Sustainable markets (aka sustainability, community ownership)

• Serving the BOP market (aka reducing disparities, equity)

• Total Market Approach (aka unusual partnerships, large scale change)

To jump-start this process, I announced that we already have over $250,000 committed to establishing a global social marketing platform (or organization or association if you like) from USAID, the National Social Marketing Centre and CDC.  This platform, at least as I am conceiving of it right now, would have as its goal:

To continually improve the knowledge base and skill level of people who use social marketing in their professional activities to improve the health and social conditions of people around the world.

With the purpose to create a set of experiences for policy-makers; program planners, evaluators and implementers; and partner organizations that provide them with knowledge and tools to utilize social marketing to improve the health of poor and vulnerable populations

Based on what we have been discussing at earlier meetings about a social marketing organization, I suggest that we offer participants in this platform:

• Guidelines for practice that harmonize social marketing practice across contexts, audiences and health and social issues

• A research and evidence-base wiki

• Online education programs

• Sponsorship and convener of e-conferences, technical forums, podcasts, topical blogs

• Technical exchanges and mentoring among experts and peers

• Curate social marketing and selected health communications journals and publications

• Serve as a resource for champions and passionaries to advocate for and educate others on social marketing

The fund-raising for this platform has just begun, and I am grateful for the early support from the organizations named above. Now comes the hard work and the challenge I posed to the audience of about 400 marketers in the room: having social marketers from around the world get really engaged in making this happen. There are obviously many things that need to be done; foremost among them is to continue raising the money to make aspirations reality. Governance structure, by-laws (the fewer the better in my view), membership criteria and dues, creating a digital social network infrastructure to support these activities, and others I hope people will suggest, all will take time. And I am prepared to commit half of my time to bring this to life by February 2009. Let us know how your colleagues, the discipline and I can count on you in ways large and small. Judging from the people already talking to me after the presentation, the right people will get involved. There is more than social marketing at stake here. If you believe, like I do, that social marketing offers the best way we currently know of to achieve positive changes in health status and social conditions, than the bottom-line is all about lives and especially serving the needs of the poorest and most vulnerable in our world.

And if you know of any corporations who believe, like the recently passed Paul Newman, in their shameless exploitation for social good, or people who are trying to discern how their philanthropy can benefit others in a very personal way, let them know of this opportunity to support and become part of the movement.

The story will continue…

Social Marketing and Health Communication in the American Journal of Public Health

Just received this note from the National Center for Health Marketing at the CDC:

We want to inform you of an exciting opportunity to publish in a special issue of the American Journal of Public Health (AJPH) focused on health communication and social marketing in public health. 

For this special journal issue, we are looking for conceptual papers on the theories and methods of health communication and social marketing as well as papers describing original, research-based, methodologically sound health communication and social marketing public health campaigns, interventions, policies and/or evaluation.  Papers should provide empirical data to support article assertions or be framed as in-depth case studies. 

Unfortunately, this opportunity comes with an accelerated timeline (initial submission due in about 4 weeks).  Therefore, we are only interested in manuscripts completed or close to completion.  If you have such work and are interested in having it considered for the AJPH special issue, please send an abstract or a draft, and a letter of intent by Friday, September 26, 2008 to Dr. Dawn Griffin ([email protected]).  If you know of another leading scholar in the area who may have a manuscript in the works, please provide his/her contact information so we can share this opportunity with him/her.  Detailed information and article guidelines will be forwarded to you directly.

We are also looking for peer reviewers for this issue. If you are interested or know of a colleague who might be interested in serving as a peer reviewer, please let us know.

This is a unique opportunity to contribute articles and/or expertise from your work to one of the most prestigious public health journals. I won't say a 'once in a lifetime chance' ... but it is the first one. There was a time when the editor of AJPH would not let me use the term 'social marketing' in an article we submitted on food labeling in grocery stores from the Pawtucket Heart Health Program. Times do change!

Designing a National Social Marketing Plan and Organization

Bob Marshall has been one of the leaders in bringing people around a conversation for a US strategic social marketing plan and organization [the update from the last meeting]. He sent out this notice that I am posting in its entirety. Take a few minutes to think about it and act.

We are conducting an online survey to give all those interested in the future of social marketing an opportunity to participate in designing the next steps for a national strategic social marketing plan and a professional organization.  The survey is designed for respondents at all levels of interest (students, new and career practitioners, etc.) and from all related fields (social marketing, public health, environment, communication, etc) - anyone interested in using social marketing as a systematic approach to promoting behavior change that benefits the individual and society. A focal point, such as a national organization, may be necessary to support and promote the role of social marketing and its practitioners in public health and other related fields.

The survey is anonymous and cannot be connected with you as an individual.  Please complete the survey and submit your results.  A summary of the analysis will be posted on our blog USSocialMarketingPlan in the next few weeks.  Act now!  We hope to have enough respondents to present a preliminary summary at the World Conference on Social Marketing in Brighton, England later this month.  Thanks so much for your interest.

Towards a More Perfect Union

The conversation over the development of a professional network for people working in social marketing and health communication continued at the National Conference on Health Communication, Marketing and Media yesterday. Moderated by Jay Bernhardt from the National Center for Health Marketing at CDC, about 40 of us discussed four questions he posed.

Why build the network?

The benefits for creating a network (and no one at the meeting disagreed with the proposition that one should be created) included:

• Access to resources

• Education and training opportunities

• Networking opportunities

• Forum for scientific exchanges

• Workforce development

• Development of professional standards

• Job postings and recruitment activities

• Develop common training competencies

• Stakeholder advocacy

• Advance a research agenda

• Professional identity (and a lot of discussion here, and throughout the meeting, about people's confusion between what is health communication and what is social marketing)

• Build relationships with other professions (marketing, economics, political science, psychology, commercial sector)

• Create an ideagora

Who should join such a network?

After a short-lived attempt to begin to list disciplines (health communication, social marketing, media relations,health promotion), the suggestion was made and generally agreed to that an organizing principle should be that people self-identify into the network and that no specific disciplinary background should be a basis for inclusion. It sounded like most people also agreed that the network should be open to anyone interested in or practicing social marketing in any field  (i.e., people working outside of public health).

What should the scope of the network be?

Here the choices focused on whether the network have a domestic (US) focus or be global in nature. The sense was that global was preferred to facilitate learning and resource exchanges across countries, cultures and contexts.

What should the structure of the network become?

The current existence of many informal networks (list serve, webinars, use of new media) is one model that could be expanded and supported. The sense of the group leaned more towards a formal organization, primarily as it was believed that this would facilitate the development of the discipline, standards of practice, a professional identity and establish a platform for advocacy. An alternative model, carving out a specific interest section in existing organizations (Public Relations Society of America, American Marketing Association), was also suggested by a few people. 

There are pages on the social marketing wiki for you to engage in the conversation and contribute your thoughts about what an association could look like and become. A Facebook group for health communication, marketing and media has also just started. And at Ning a group will be posting their notes from the conference.

Discovering 2700 More Social Marketers

I just returned from Nashville where I sat in on some of the Training Institutes for developing local systems of care for children and adolescents with mental health needs and their families. The meeting convened over 2,700 professionals, kids and families who work within local coalitions to tackle these issues in communities across the US. For social marketers interested in issues such as reducing mental illness stigma, the work goes on in these communities on a daily basis - complete with funded staff positions entitled 'social marketing coordinators.'

I went to the opening session to meet up with Dr. David Satcher who was receiving a lifetime achievement award and listen to his address to the meeting (Dr. Satcher was the Director when we at Prospect Associates began supporting the CDC in its venture into the worlds of health communication and social marketing). He was preceded to the podium by Dr. Gary Blau who provides the leadership for this overall effort at SAMHSA. Midway through his talk, Gary asked the crowd "Who here is a social marketer?" and everyone yelled back "We are." A quick check with other people sitting at my table confirmed that yes, for over 7 years the projects funded by SAMHSA have all adopted the rhetoric (if not quite the practice as I saw it there and think about it here) of social marketing. Who knew?

And who knew that over 1,000 social marketers would enroll in the social marketing e-conference; 300 would attend the Social Marketing in Public Health conference (despite worries about the availability of travel funds for government-funded projects and state agency staff); that as of this past Friday Alan Andreasen reports there are 1,758 social marketing listserver subscribers - and then there's the over 500 loyal subscribers here! It seems time for the movement to coalesce social marketers to begin.

Stay tuned - there was one session in Clearwater Beach exploring the prospects of a society of social marketing where the discussion focused on questions of what the conceptual base for a society could be (marketing, health communication, behavioral or social sciences), the fields of practice it might include (PR and advertising people, social workers, community nurses - who IS a social marketer?), its geographic scope (US, North American, global) and the structure of the exchange between the organization and its members (service and member benefits and features). This is just the beginning of the conversation among people who gather at social marketing meetings; make a note that two more such gatherings are planned at the CDC health marketing conference in August and the world social marketing conference in Brighton England in September. To broaden our ability to participate and capture a true range and sense of the community on these and other issues, should we get some pages started for an extended conversation about a professional association of social marketers on the social marketing wiki? Or leave your comments here.